Submission + - Senator to FCC: no broadcast flag for you!
Flag waver writes: Senator John Sununu (R-NH) will introduce legislation that will prevent the FCC from creating technology mandates for the consumer electronics industry. As a result, the FCC would be hamstrung in its efforts to revive the broadcast flag. '"The FCC seems to be under the belief that it should occasionally impose technology mandates," Sununu said in a statement. "These misguided requirements distort the marketplace by forcing industry to adopt agency-blessed solutions rather than allow innovative and competitive approaches to develop."' Sen. Sununu previously tried without success to remove the broadcast flag provisions from the massive telecommunications bill that died before reaching the Senate floor during the last Congress.
Submission + - A Cheaper iPhone?
mattnyc99 writes: Now that it's been a full 48 hours since the iPhone announcement, some of the "wow" factor is transitioning into the cold reality of how expensive the thing is. The result? A ton of chatter about cheaper alternatives (or at least Apple's coming competition), from the open-sourced Moko to Samsung's secret weapon to an LG model that the masses are claiming Steve Jobs ripped off. Would you settle for anything less than the iPhone cometh?
Submission + - Firms Introduce BitTorrent Optimized CPU, or.. BPU
oxide7 writes: "According to IBT: "Trading movies and other large data files online through the popular BitTorrent delivery platform may soon happen on simple consumer devices, thanks to a pair of companies that are creating specifically designed processors that can handle what PCs can do today.
Iadea Corp., a Taiwan-based licensee of BitTorrent technology, and Star Semiconductor Corp., an affiliate of the semiconductor giant UMC Group, jointly announced the world's first BitTorrent-optimized microprocessor chip on Thursday.""
Journal Journal: Debian PPC quarrels force users to move elsewhere 8
I am keeping up with the Debian PPC mailing list for some months now and apart from bug reports there is only one main theme: some nasty infighting between key Debian PPC developers. Today, January 11, Mathew Binkley send the following message to the mailing list:
Greetings. I am the senior system administrator at Vanderbilt University's supercomputing center. We operate a 1500 processor cluster for researchers at Vanderbilt.
Wikileaks — Anonymous Whistle-Blowing 162
too_old_to_be_irate writes to tell us about a site that word got out on before they were ready. Wikileaks aims to be an anonymous and uncensorable repository of leaked documents, posted for commentary by interested parties. It's expected to go live in a month or two. From the site: "Wikileaks is developing an uncensorable version of Wikipedia for untraceable mass document leaking and analysis. Our primary interests are oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, but we also expect to be of assistance to those in the west who wish to reveal unethical behavior in their own governments and corporations. We aim for maximum political impact; this means our interface is identical to Wikipedia and usable by non-technical people. We have received over 1.1 million documents so far from dissident communities and anonymous sources."
Submission + - Pr0n vs. Sony, Round 2: First Betamax, now Blu-Ray
Ozymand E. Us writes: :This just in, from the Las Vegas bureau:
http://www.tgdaily.com/2007/01/11/ces2007_hddvd_bl u_ray/
Apparently, the porn industry is coming down on the side of Toshiba's HD-DVD over Sony's Blu-Ray. Why? for reasons including: ease of manufacture, lower costs, and-oh, the millions of HD-DVD players sold- in the form of XBOX 360s. For those who remember the format wars of the 80s, things are not looking good for the Blu-Ray camp.
Bet they wish they hadn't delayed the PS3, huh?
http://www.tgdaily.com/2007/01/11/ces2007_hddvd_b
Apparently, the porn industry is coming down on the side of Toshiba's HD-DVD over Sony's Blu-Ray. Why? for reasons including: ease of manufacture, lower costs, and-oh, the millions of HD-DVD players sold- in the form of XBOX 360s. For those who remember the format wars of the 80s, things are not looking good for the Blu-Ray camp.
Bet they wish they hadn't delayed the PS3, huh?
Submission + - iPhone Killer Apps
Fidel Guajardo writes: "Because the iPhone runs on OS X, we should see some new or existing applications ported over to the iPhone. Here is a short list of some possible killer apps that would truly be convenient to operate from an iPhone. While some of these concepts already exist, I believe the iPhone would make them even more user-friendly and popular."
Submission + - Format war is over as pr0n has chosen sides
profet writes: It seems that one of the last heavyweights in the format war has chosen its hardware. Various members of the adult film industry have decided on HD-DVD. The reasons seem to be based primarily on cost of manufacturing. History has shown that the porn industry can be a driving factor for technology. Can bluray recover from such a tremendous blow? Does HD DVD have the market penetration that everyone claims?
Submission + - PC World Editor Slain in Drug Related Robberyyyyy!
Submission + - Engineering Challenges of the next century
An anonymous reader writes: The National Academy of Engineering has gathered a committee of the super-geeks to discuss the Engineering Challenges facing the world. Some of the committee members are known names in IT or are otherwise known for their engineering/technology leadership.
MSNBC picked it up earlier.
Journal Journal: dealing with spam bounces
http://www.postfix.org/BACKSCATTER_README.html
Submission + - Changes to the NetFlix Queue/Ship Algorithm
zyzzx0 writes: "It's been well-known and documented that part of the NetFlix 'mode d'operation' is a complex algorithm that, in some cases, will delay shipment to heavy renters. Very recently, in two separate cases, we have a queue of two or three DVDs that are from a single season of a television series. In both cases, disk two and three came a day or two before disk one, forcing us to put a pause to our Battlestar Galactica watching. This doesn't seem to be documented anywhere, and hasn't discouraged my un-dying NetFlix love. (I dislike Blockbuster enough to never go back.) Has anyone else seen this trend, or change in 'shipping algorithm'?
And what about the latest reports that NetFlix is going to finally unveil their digital renting strategy?"
And what about the latest reports that NetFlix is going to finally unveil their digital renting strategy?"
Submission + - pr0n going HD-DVD
YLee writes: heise news reports (German only): According to Joone (founder of Digital Playground and "star director" of HD porn) SONY is trying to prevent the use of BD for distibution of adult entertainment material. Joone: "SONY wants me to use HD-DVD for distibution". First his plan was to go the BD route but every BlueRay press plant in the USA refused to cooperate with his company. Betamax/Video2000 deja-vu, anyone? (Max Grundig: "This crap won't make it on my tapes!")
Submission + - Business 2.0's dumbest moments in business
prostoalex writes: "Every year Business 2.0 magazine comes up with 101 dumbest moments in business, and now they published their 2006 list. While there're quite a few entrants from the technology world, such as Sony's rootkit distributed on music CDs, and Google's decision to blacklist CNet after a reporter googles private information on the company CEO, most of the entries, including the leading one, are from the wild real estate market."
